Answers to Common Questions

Domain Name FAQ

A domain name, like www.coolexample.com, is a lot like a street address for a house or business. Let's use the White House as an example. The street address, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, is an exact location — like an IP address. You might not know the exact street address, but when you visit Washington, D.C., you can tell your cabbie that you want to visit the White House and still get there. This is how a domain name is used: It's an easy way to reach the exact location of a website without having to remember its numeric address.

A domain name consists of, at least, a top-level and a second-level domain. A top-level domain (TLD) is the part of the domain name located to the right of the dot ("."). The most common TLDs are .com, .net, and .org.

Many domains, also called extensions, can be registered by anyone, like .com, .net, and .org. A second-level domain (SLD) is the portion of the domain name that is located immediately to the left of the dot and domain name extension. For example, the SLD in coolexample.com is coolexample.

Advanced Domain Name Description: A domain name represents a physical point on the Internet — an IP address. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) governs coordination of the links between IP addresses and domain names across the Internet. With this standardized coordination, you can find websites on the Internet by entering domain names instead of IP addresses into your Web browser.

An IP (Internet Protocol) address is a unique identifying string of numbers, like 216.27.61.137, given to every individual computer, server, and network on the Internet. Like a license plate is used to help identify vehicles, an IP address is used to identify and locate information online. Additionally, they allow for communication over the internet between devices and networks connected to the internet.

The www before your domain name is a subdomain, not part of the domain name itself. Therefore, if you set up your www CNAME record to point to your primary A record, your site will resolve both at www.coolexample.com and coolexample.com.

If you can reach your website by typing in your domain without the www but cannot reach it when you type the www, then your CNAME might be set up incorrectly. Follow the instructions below to ensure your domain name's settings are correct.

When visitors enter your domain name into a Web browser, the browser request uses your domain name to find the domain name's associated IP address and, therefore, the website. People use domain names instead of IP addresses because it is easier to remember a name rather than a series of numbers.

Your domain name and its associated IP address are stored in a common database along with every other domain and associated IP address that are accessible via the Internet.

A URL, or Uniform Resource Locator, is the address of an Internet website or webpage. Think of a URL as a street address for the location of information on the Internet. For instance, a complete URL like http://coolexample.com/music, points you to the music page of the coolexample.com website.

Take a look at the anatomy of this URL to better understand how they direct online users to specific information: http://coolexample.com/funky/music.html

Nameservers are the Internet's equivalent to phone books. A nameserver maintains a directory of domain names that match certain IP addresses (computers). The information from all the nameservers across the Internet is gathered in a central registry.

Nameservers make it possible for visitors to access your website using a familiar domain name, instead of having to remember a series of numbers.

Registering a domain name does not automatically activate a website that displays when visitors enter your domain name into a Web browser. The domain name must have a hosted website that includes a numeric address, called an IP address, for visitors to access the website using your domain name.

Besides setting up a website, there are a number of things you can do with your domain name once you register it.

Sell it — Domain names can be a great investment. If you have registered a domain name that you are not using, maybe someone else can. You can set up a For Sale parked page to let visitors know that it's available — and don't forget to include your contact information. See Auctions FAQ for more information.

Protect your brand online — The more domain names you register, the better. Prevent others from registering a similar domain name to yours. These similar domain names can steal your customers or confuse them. What can you do with all these domain names? Forward them to your main domain name's website. See Manually Forwarding or Masking Your Domain Name for more information.

Hold on to it — Maybe you haven't decided what to do with your new domain name. Don't worry — there's no rush. You can leave it parked with us for the length of your registration. You can also monetize it by setting it up in a CashParking® account. See CashParking FAQ for more information.

If you're thinking about registering more than one domain name, you've got the right idea. Registering and using multiple domains names is great for building your business, protecting your brand name, and creating a dynamic online identity.

When you register multiple domain names, you can:

Keep your competition from registering a similar domain name drawing customers to them instead of you.Promote the different products and services you offer.Drive more traffic to your website.Enjoy more opportunities to market to — and be listed in — search engines.Create distinct advertising strategies reaching different target markets.Provide customers more ways to find you when searching the Internet.Capture common misspellings of your domain name, instead of sending visitors to an error page.Protect your brand and online identity.

Usually, a domain name is not available for re-registration as soon as it expires. Most registrars allow a grace period that can be as short as one or two weeks or as long as a year for registrants to renew expired domain names. The actual grace period can be different for each individual registrar and domain name extension. That is, the grace period for a .com domain name might be different from the grace period for a .us domain name, even at the same registrar.

After the registrar's grace period, most domain names have a redemption period. This period can last from two weeks to 30 days, and, during this time, the current registrant can renew the domain name by paying a redemption fee along with the domain name's renewal fee.

If the current registrant does not renew or redeem the domain name, it might be auctioned. When a domain name is released to a public auction, you can participate and possibly capture the domain name by placing a bid on it.

If the domain name is not renewed, redeemed, or purchased through an auction, it is returned to its registry. The registry determines when the domain name is released again for registration. Once it's released, you can register the domain name through us.

You can upload your website files directly through cPanel. This will publish your website live on the internet.

Preparing your filesUploading more than one file? You can save yourself a lot of time by creating a ZIP file on your computer with all of your website files. This is because the file manager in cPanel can only upload one file at a time.

Upload your files

In your cPanel dashboard, under Files, click File Manager.

If an option window displays, select the directory you want to open, and then click Go

Note:cPanel uses public_html as the root directory of your primary domain name's website. If you want to upload your website to the internet, this is where you should start. If you want to upload a website for a secondary or add-on domain, you should first verify your website's root directory.

Navigate to the directory where you want to upload the file.

Click Choose File, locate the file on your local machine, and then click OK.

After you upload the file you want, click Back to...

Repeat these steps for any other files you want to upload.

Next Steps

Now that your website is uploaded, you can visit your website by navigating to your domain in your web browser.

If you used this guide to upload a ZIP file, you can unzip that file with the file manager.

This runs the SQL file and updates the database as specified in your SQL file. It might take several minutes to restore the database.

Note:
If you receive an error message stating "Script timeout passed, if you want to finish import, please resubmit same file and import will resume" you can immediately select the same file to import and continue the restore where it left off.

After the database restores, make sure your connection strings are up to date.

The root directory of your website is the content that loads when visitors access your domain name in a Web browser. The most
obvious consequence of this is that you need to put your "index file" in your website's root directory for visitors to see your site at all.

Follow any instructions or run any files that download to complete the configuration.

Specify the following:

Your name.

Your email address.

Account type. If you want to keep copies of messages on the server, select the IMAP option. If you do not want to
keep any messages on the server, select the POP3 option. Selecting IMAP will also allow you to train the SpamAssassin spam filter on email
messages you receive, if SpamAssassin is enabled on the server.

Managing Files

You should always keep backups of your website — there's no other way to prepare for the unexpected.

Backup in Plesk step by step.

Log in to the Plesk Panel.

From the Domains tab, click the domain. (If the correct domain isn't listed, choose it's subscription from the drop down
menu in the upper right.)

Select the Websites & Domains tab.

Select the Backup Manager in the right hand menu.

Backups on demand

Select Back Up.

Server Repository will be selected by default unless you have set up a FTP repository.

In Plesk 12, under the Backup Settings section select the radio button labeled Domain configuration and content. Leave
the drop box the way it is.

In Plesk 12.5 under Backup Content->Type, select Full or Incrememental as needed. An incremental backup will only backup those files which have changed
since the last backup. For this reason we recommend Full backups.

DO NOT select the Suspend domain until backup task is completed. Should the backup fail, your domain would remain
suspended and inaccessible to your website viewers.

Once the backup is completed you can download it from the main backup screen by clicking on the Green Circle/Arrow icon
on the right side of the backup listing.

Preparing your filesUploading more than one file? You can save yourself a lot of time by creating a ZIP file on your computer with all of your website files. This is because the file manager in cPanel can only upload one file at a time.

You can upload files using one of the 2 below methods.

1. Using File Manager in Parallels Plesk Hosting Account.

Login to your Plesk Panel.

You can now see lot of icons out of them click on “File Manager” icon to open the “httpdocs” folder or Find “httpdocs” folder below the Domain Name.this is by default which is the public folder on plesk based servers.

In the File Manager, click on the “Upload Files” option in the toolbar on top. Browse and select your website file you want to upload. For faster upload or restore of your website, we recommend that you create a compressed file in “.zip” folder of your website files and folders on your local computer and then Browse & Select to upload. This will upload your .zip file.

Once website .zip file is uploaded and appears in the list, click on the checkbox next to it and Then find “Extract Files” and click on it. This will unzip all your website files and folders to the httpdocs folder.

Next Steps

Now that your website is uploaded, you can visit your website by navigating to your domain in your web browser.

If you used this guide to upload a ZIP file, you can unzip that file with the file manager.

Earlier versions of Plesk required the use of database management tools to dump databases, but Plesk 12.5 allows you to back up (by
exporting a database dump as an SQL file) and restore them (by importing a database dump as an SQL file) without having to leave the control panel.

In Parallels Plesk Panel, you create databases and then either create new users for it, or grant existing users access.

Login to your Plesk account. On the homepage, click on the “Databases” icon on the middle section of your panel or find
on right hand side from the list.

Then click on the “Add a Database” option on the page to get a form. Fill in the Database Name you desire and also create
a Database Username and Password. Make sure you select MS SQL in Database Type.

NOTE: You will need to change the Data source/Server name, Database Name, Database Username and Database Password in your web application’s Connection String as per database created on server.

Once database is created, Now you can see your newly created database in list in Database section on your screen.

The root directory of your website is the content that loads when visitors access your domain name in a Web browser. The most
obvious consequence of this is that you need to put your "index file" in your website's root directory for visitors to see your site at all.

Your website's root directory depends on whether the domain name is your primary domain name or another type.

Your primary domain name's root directory is /httpdocs

Secondary and subdomain names' root directories were specified when they were set up. You can find them listed in Plesk.

To Find Secondary (Addon) and Subdomains' Root Directories

Log in to your Plesk Panel.

In the Domains section, click either Subdomains or Addon Domains, depending on the type of domain you're using.

In the section for each domain name, the root directory displays in the Website at field. By default, the root directory is the domain name itself followed by a forward slash, e.g. subdomain.coolexample.com/